Improvement in suspenders



UNITED STATES PATENT OFFICE.

A. wooDAED, or BANGOR, MAINE.

IMPROVEMENT IN SUSPENDERS.

Specification forming part of Letters Patent No. 57,426, dated August 21, 1866.

To all whom 'it may concern.-

Beit known that I, ANTHONY VOODARD, of Bangor, in the county of Penobscot and State of Maine, have invented a new and useful Improvement in Suspenders and Shoulder- Braces; and I do hereby declare that the following is a full, clear, and exact description thereof, reference being had to the accompanying drawings, and to the letters of reference marked thereon, in which- Figure l is a perspective view of my invention, with a portion of the sheath or case cut away to show the internal arrangement. Fig. 2 is also a perspective view of myinvention complete, and Fig. 3 is a longitudinal section thereof.

Similar letters of reference indicate corresponding parts in the several gures.

The nature of my invention consists in providin g suspenders and shoulder-braces with a peculiarlyarran ged metallic spring, by which to render them elastic and yielding, thereby conforming in their length to the various positions of the body of the wearer.

To enable others skilled in the art to make and use my invention, I will proceed to describe its construction and operation.

In the drawings, A represents the webbing as. usually employed in the construction of similar articles, and which constitutes the principal length thereof. B is the face, and B the back, of a sheath or case, which is united at its edges by stitches, as shown. Between these two parts ofthe sheath, atits upper end, is inserted the webbing A, and the three parts are united by sewing through the whole. The lower end of the sheath is left open.

t a is a zigzag spring formed of elastic wire. This spring, which is fully shown by dotted lines at its upper part in Fig. ],is formed with a series of short right and left hand curves, the direction from curve to curve being a right line, or nearly so, thus establishing a limited and uniform distance between the curves and equally distributing the expansion and contraction throughout the length of the spring, which length may be varied, as desired. The direction of pressure upon the spring is upon the flattened faces ofthe wire.

C is a loop or stirrup, which passes around spring a a lengthwise, and in its united ends at the bottom is formed the buttoirhole c. This loop as it passes around spring a a is clearly shown in Fig. 3.

The lower end of spring a, a is fastened to the sheath B B by the stitches d (l, which embrace t-he two lower curves of the spring, and maypass through either or both parts of the sheath, thus serving to retain the spring in the sheath, while the upper end of the loop is secured to the upper end ofthe spring to keep both in their proper relative positions.

The use and operation of this invention is as follows: The stirru'p C being attached to the buttons at the back of the pants, and the opposite end of the suspenders being attached to the front buttons, the tension is brought compressively Yupon spring a a by the stirrup or loop C, which acts upon it by a downward pressure produced upon its, upper end, while the lower end is acted upon by an upward pressure by means of stitches d d, securingit to the sheath, as described. Thus every movement of the wearer which increases the strain upon the suspender and tends to elongate it serves equally to compress and shorten the spring, the resistance of which is thereby increased as the tension is augmented.

This invention affords a cheap and durable method of obtaining a delinite amount of elasticity in a neat and compact form.

Having thus described my invention, I desire to state that I do not claim the zigzag spring a a, broadly, as such springs have been before constructed; but

What I do claim as new, and desire to secure by Letters Patent, is

The arrangement of spring a a, stirrup. or loop C, and sheath .B B', when constructed and arranged to operate in manner substantially as and for the purposes specified.

A. WOODARD.

Witnesses T. W. PORTER, H. L. MITCHELL. 

